Spilt Wine

As the saying goes, donkeys have big ears. Gracie has become really good at picking up and listening to conversations between Audrey and I, then asking questions to things she doesn’t need to know. If I remember right, Audrey and I were talking about some ones divorce when Gracie chimed in with her questions. At that point Audrey began spelling words out so that Gracie would not know what was being said. Gracie then with a frustrated look on her face says to Audrey “ Stop it momma! When did you learn another language?”

Today I attended the funeral service for the Sheriff Deputy that was murdered in the line of duty earlier this week. The service was sorrowful and sad. The combination of his untimely death which is so close to Christmas and that he left three small children behind was heart breaking. Everytime his children were mention, I broke. Two times during the service I got the chills. The first was when the bag pipes were played and second was seeing all of the diffent agencies that came to pay their respects and support. I was going to write more about it, but then I came across this comment left on the Times Delta web site which is far better than what I can come up with. The comment is as follows:


"A co-worker and I stood for almost two hours on the overpass, waiting for the procession to pass by. There were dozens of others with us, and we chatted and compared our motivations for being there. The media was all around, and we tried to ignore them!

After our long wait, at last the traffic stopped and the freeway was eerily quiet. In the distance, we could see the headlights of the Highway Patrol precision motorcycle corps, leading the way. Every voice grew silent, as the motorcade escorting the hearse and the family passed under us.

What followed defies description. More law enforcement cars than I would even attempt to count, hundreds upon hundreds, their red and blue lights a somber sight for as far as the eye could see. From Visalia, Tulare County, Kings County, Kern County, Farmersville, Selma, Fresno, Madera, Merced, Reedley, Lemoore, Arvin, and even Amador County. Many other insignia I could not read through my tears. Hundreds of them, some unmarked, some obviously undercover motorcycle cops, ambulances, fire trucks, even a contingent from the COS police academy.

It was a moving, heartbreaking experience, standing there simply and quietly to honor the sacrifice of a fine young man...and to show his widow and children that the people he died protecting are grateful."

I read Gracie the story of Jesus’ birth the other night as a bedtime story. I figured since it is almost Christmas it was as good of a story as any. Never before have I realized how dysfunctional of a story this is. I have read and been taught that this is a story of God’s coming, which he choose to do so in a non-glorfying way. In way that was unnoticed, except to three crazy astronomers and in a way of total weakness and poorest of circumstances. Of this, is something that no one would expect of the prophesied King. I mean this is the Son of God we are talking about here. He could of come in a much more authoritative and glorified manner, but he didn’t. This isn’t the part of the story that disturbed me though.

It is written that when King Herod had heard of the birth of a King in Bethlehem he became threatened and asked the wise men to bring the baby to him so that he too could worship the new born King. Of course the wise men knew this was a trick and did not do as they were asked. Then the most cruel, disturbing and nefarious thing happens. King Herod orders the death of all male children ages two and younger in an attempt to rid of what he feels is a threat to his throne, the baby Jesus, the new born King. As we all know, an angel appeared before Joseph and directed him to take Marry and Jesus and flee to Egypt to escape the massacre.

I don’t know why the death of the newborn babies bother so much. It has never before, I have always read over that part of the story without much consideration of what that means or what that would have been like for the families who had their children murdered. Maybe it is because I have two children now, one of the which is a newborn and this part of the story hits a little close to home now. I don’t know… I did a little research though. It is guessed that between 20 and 200 babies were murdered at King Herod’s command. From what I have read most scholars believe the number of murdered babies between 20 and 50.

Odd that the good news for most of us, being that the Savior was born, meant bad news for the families who had their babies murdered.